


The Avengers' Ass-Off

by MissCora



Category: Captain America (2011), Incredible Hulk (2008), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel (Movies), Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, Thor (2011)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-18
Updated: 2012-04-18
Packaged: 2017-11-03 20:52:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/385822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissCora/pseuds/MissCora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In a contest for which Avenger has the best ass, no one would have bet on the Hulk.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Avengers' Ass-Off

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired, in a very lose, random sort of way, by [this image](http://gingerhaze.tumblr.com/post/20473999577/bros-bros-bros) by Gingerhaze.

There was nothing about the scene in the living room that would have warned Bruce just what level of madness he was about to walk into, which he personally felt was unfair. Usually when his teammates were being particularly unmanageable there were signs—Clint crouched up on top of the entertainment center with a blow gun, or Thor sprawled half off the couch, unconscious and using his cape a blanket, something, _anything_ to let him know that it was time to start with the deep, calming breaths. But no, it was just Clint and Natasha on the couch, with Tony peering over the back trying to get a look at whatever it was Clint was reading.

Well, there was also Steve in the armchair, blushing like a fire hydrant, but honestly? That was not really a sufficient warning. Melted cheese could make Steve blush.

“Seriously,” Tony was saying as Bruce stepped into the room, “this is completely unfair. I’m operating under a handicap and I fucking hate golf so that’s just not on.”

“Handicap, shmandicap, it’s not like you’d win even without the armor. Face it, you’re turning forty, your training regime is weak, and you’re simply outclassed.”

“Bite me, Barton. My ass is glorious, and I’d be happy to drop trou right here and prove it.”

Bruce and Steve both choked at that, but where Steve was burying his head in his hands, Bruce simply asked, “What on earth are you talking about?”

“This.” Darting forward, Tony snatched what turned out to be a glossy magazine out of Clint’s hands, waving it around for barely a second before Natasha stole it back. “Cosmo’s run a story on us.”

“Yeah? Is there a quiz?”

“Better,” crowed Clint, “an online poll! The masses, voting on our asses!”

Nat gave Clint a flat look, arching an eyebrow. “How long have you been holding that one in?” she asked.

“Ten minutes, give or take.” 

“I’m impressed, Clint. That’s practically restraint.”

“I’m still confused.” 

Reaching down, Tony recovered the magazine and handed it to Bruce, who stared, torn between laughter and horror. There in bold print, the words popping off the page: Iconic, Mythic, and Marvelous—The Assets of the Avengers! And below it, a picture. From the uniform, it had to be Clint, that was definitely his bow, but Bruce could honestly say (and be glad of it) that he otherwise would not have recognized the man. “That,” he said after a moment, “is a very . . . interestingly framed photo, Clint.”

“The editors _clearly_ think I should win, hence giving me top billing.”

“Top bill . . . oh. Yes. Um . . .” 

“This once, I won’t kill you for staring.” It was the clear tone of amusement in Nat’s voice that got Bruce’s eyes up and away from the leather clad . . . assets on the page, and now he was blushing to rival Steve.

“Sorry, Natasha.”

“No, really, it’s all right. After all, the results of the poll are going to show that I clearly have the nicest ass on the team.”

“It’s just unfair! The Iron Man armor is not nearly as flattering as leather cat suits, and Pepper gets angry when I leave the house without pants.”

Turning the page, Bruce found that, indeed, the article continued with pictures of the Iron Man’s ass, and Captain America’s blue clad derriere, and directly opposite was Thor and . . . “Dear God, why do they have the Hulk in here?”

“Well, they couldn’t exactly leave you out, how would that be fair?” Tony said, leaning against the back of the couch to look at Bruce. “Don’t feel bad. I’m sure _somebody_ will vote for you.”

“Size queens,” Clint put in cheerfully, and for a moment Bruce was _very_ tempted to lose his shit. The moment was, thankfully, interrupted.

“I assume I don’t want to know what that means,” came Steve’s muffled voice.

All four of them turned to stare at the man who was finally looking up from his hands, the blush just beginning to recede, although it still stained his cheeks and the tips of his ears. After a moment Tony simply said, “Yeah, no.”

\---

It wasn’t like Bruce didn’t know his life was ridiculous. He spent a fair portion of his life as an “enormous green rage monster,” and a (thankfully) much larger portion of his life doing everything possible to avoid that, so it wasn’t like the baseline of his life was anything even vaguely approaching normal. And that was before one included the fact that he was part of a team that, for lack of a better term, battled evil together. Ridiculous was, frankly, the nicest term one could use to describe his life. Still, there was ridiculous and then there was this.

“Hawkeye, would you quit posing for the cameras. There’s no way the most efficient way to get up there is by climbing the drainpipe. I know for a fact that building has stairs.” 

“Oh, like the Widow needs all the extra flashy bending and flexing she’s been doing all afternoon. She’s trying to rig the vote!”

“You’re _both_ cheating.” It was shocking just how much like a petulant child a man who was worth hundreds of billions of dollars could sound.

Bruce sighed from the S.H.I.E.L.D. cordon where he was waiting, hoping they weren’t going to need him. There were some days when he _really_ hated his life.

“Cut the chatter.” Steve’s voice sounded like he wasn’t any more amused by them than Bruce was, but it was futile. Once Tony and Clint got going there was no stopping them.

“Hey, look at it this way, Cap,” Tony said, and Bruce controlled the instinctive flinch as the Iron Man suit blasted past, much too close for comfort. “At least we’re using code names this time.”

“Small favors,” Phil Coulson muttered from near where Bruce was standing, and he shot the agent a wry look. 

“I don’t care,” Steve answered. “Keep the chatter off the line and focus.” He almost sounded angry, and for a long moment the comms stayed silent, although it was hardly _quiet_ given the rolling thunder and repulsor blasts coming from the far side of the block. Still, Bruce was hopeful that they would actually stay on task long enough to get this done and he could go back to his lab without ruining yet another pair of trousers.

The glimmer of hope, really, was what doomed him. 

“~I don’t think you’re ready for this jelly, I don’t think you’re ready for this jelly. I don’t think you’re ready for this jelly; my body’s too booty-licious for ya, babe.~” The fact that Clint could actually sing was not a saving grace in the slightest and Bruce lost it.

\---

“How do you explain this!” 

Bruce blinked, startled, and stared at the laptop that was being shoved in his face. “Explain what, Clint?”

“The poll results. How is the Hulk suddenly doing so well?”

“I . . . have no idea?” Bruce said, staring at the browser window. “I’m also not entirely clear how fifth place counts as ‘so well’.” 

“You overtook Thor! You jumped up by thousands of votes over night!”

“Clint, you seem somewhat worked up about this.”

“I just don’t get it!”

“I would seriously appreciate it if you would get your laptop out of my face and stop yelling, Clint. Now.”

“But . . .”

“Back off, Clint.” Natasha’s voice was uncompromising as she came into the living room and settled down on the couch. Clint scowled at her but did back off, flopping down next to her and frowning at his screen.

“I still want to know how this happened.”

“G-plus,” Tony said, looking up from his phone.

“What?”

“There’s a get-out-the-vote campaign going on for the good Doctor on Google-plus. Seems like the techie nerds found out about the poll and are making a push For Science.”

“You’re campaigning!” Clint sounded like he’d actually been wounded, and the way he theatrically clutched at his chest didn’t do anything to help the image.

“I am not,” Bruce said, scowling. “I don’t care about that stupid poll and I don’t know anything about a Google-plus movement.”

“Bruce!” Thor’s voice boomed down the hallway and Nat didn’t jump but the rest of them did, flinching away from the noise and the thought of what Thor might have to say about the poll. 

“Does he know?” Bruce asked, leaning forward, looking worried.

Natasha just smiled and Clint almost fell off the couch laughing as Thor came striding in to the living room.

“Bruce, there you are. I must offer you my congratulations, my friend! I hear you have bested me in this competition that absorbs our companions’ attention.”

Bruce simply blinked at him for a long moment, nonplussed. “Ah . . . thank you, Thor,” he said at last.

“Thor, you do understand what the competition is, don’t you?” Tony asked, head cocked, considering the situation the way one might consider a particularly gruesome train wreck. 

“Indeed, Natasha has explained it to me. The Hulk is a mighty warrior—well can I understand why the people of Midgard would admire him.”

“ . . . okay,” Tony said after a moment. “We’ll go with that for an explanation.”

\---

The lab was Bruce’s safe space. Tony had given him the room soon after they’d all moved into the mansion and told him that as long as he didn’t blow out any of the structural supports without at least twenty minutes’ warning he could do whatever he wanted in there and, like Tony’s own workshop on the floor below, nobody could come in without his permission. It was a quiet haven in a world of madness. 

Quiet, that is, except when Tony dropped by every month or so to poke around. It didn’t happen often, and the break was usually welcome, so Bruce didn’t exactly startle when he heard the door to the lab slide open and Tony’s familiar steps. “Hey, Bruce,” he called as he rounded the corner. “Congrats, man. I owe you a beer or something. Tea, I guess. Oh, hey, one of those fancy teas with the tapioca balls in them, yeah? Or are you anti-tapioca? I admit I don’t get it, who wants pudding with their tea? But then, who wants tea? And I don’t know if they do the tapioca thing in chamomile, I think that would probably be vile, so, strike that, new idea, there’s a Japanese tea house that opened down on the lower east side, with the girls in kimono and proper macha and everything.”

Breaking into Tony Stark’s stream of thought was never exactly _easy_ , but eventually Bruce managed to ask, “What are you talking about?”

“You made it to fourth place, man. I can be gracious in defeat, congratulate the victor, spoils of war and all that, plus I still say I’d win if the question wasn’t about the Avengers. If we were talking who looked best in formal wear it’d be me, hands down, the rest of you don’t know style when it beats you in the back of the head with a brick, but it’s the armor and metal just doesn’t flex the way, apparently, your ragged, ripped pants do.”

“I’m in fourth place,” Bruce repeated, blinking. “The Hulk beat you in that stupid poll, so you want to take me out for tea?”

“What, do you have wax in your ears, buddy? Yeah, get with the program. Nothing in here’s gonna blow up in the next four hours, right? Come on, let’s get while the getting’s good. If we loiter too long, Pep’ll figure out I’ve skipped out on the board and she’ll be on the warpath.” 

There were so many things about this situation that didn’t even begin to make sense, so Bruce gave it up as a lost cause and just shrugged. “Sure, let me get my coat.”

\---

The thing of it was that there’s a certain predictability to these things. The night after they’d found out about the poll, Tony had explained. 

“It’s like American Idol,” he’d said, and Clint had started to say something snarky about why Tony would even know anything about American Idol, but Tony just talked right over him, “or any time you get the mass public involved. It’s all marketing. Nat’s got an advantage by being the only girl on the poll, so anybody who’s fond of lady-asses is voting for hers. But she’s not going to simply hands-down _win_ because Cosmo, for the most part, is not marketed to a lady-ass-loving demo. Conversely, either Steve or Clint on their own would have it in the bag, but they’ll be splitting the boy-ass-ogling vote between them. Most of the people voting for me probably have a fondness for bad boys. Thor, despite having a better ass than the armor, you’ll suffer because the bible belt’s still not totally comfortable with the whole deity thing. Well, and the cape factor. Looks great flying and flapping in the wind, but totally covers the goods. The public wants an unimpeded view of all the glorious, leather clad, heroic assets.”

None of that, however, really explained what was happening with Bruce’s numbers.

“My boyfriend has a nicer ass than Captain America.” Even through his cell phone’s little speakers, he could hear the smug note in Betty’s voice. “The public has had their say and they have declared that my taste is excellent and my boyfriend is better than the peak of human perfection.”

“I would be a whole lot more comfortable with this if it were about me and not the Hulk.”

“This being the poll or the conversation?”

“The poll,” Bruce said, stretching his legs out under his desk. “I’m not sure there’s anything on earth that would make me more comfortable with this conversation.”

“Aw, come on, Bruce, it’s funny. It’s a triumph of the Everyman.” 

“Steve’s pretty darn everyman-esque. I think there’s an argument to be made where Steve basically _is_ the Everyman.”

“Steve’s an overblown science experiment.”

“Hey, I resemble that remark.” Bruce couldn’t help but smile—Betty had had to finish up her contract with Culver University and they didn’t get to talk as much as they would like, given Bruce’s uncertain schedule. Still, she’d applied to a number of positions in New York for next year, and just being able to talk to her again, openly, not having to hide, was a miracle he wasn’t going to take for granted. 

“No, but, really, you’re the one people relate to. Steve’s too perfect and Thor’s _worse_. Tony’s ridiculous, and Natasha’s brilliantly scary. This whole thing’s going to come down to you and Clint, and you can totally take him.”

“Your faith in me is heart warming, really, Betty, but still disturbing. How is the Hulk something anyone can relate to?”

“Not the Hulk, Bruce, _you_. Not everybody can be a billionaire or a super soldier or a master assassin, let alone a _god_ , but you give off an air of normality. Of being just a guy, thrown into this situation and making the best of it. People get that.”

“Ten foot tall, green, rage beast, Betty.”

“Yeah, well, people also understand about having bad days.”

“. . . I think I just don’t understand about people.”

“I’ve known that about you for years, Bruce.”

\---

Bruce stared down at the screen, partly horrified but mostly just confused as he tried to take it in. “How am I in first place?” he asked, not really expecting an answer.

“Not just first place, bud, you’ve won. They closed the poll a while ago.” Clint slapped him on the back just this side of too hard—something he’d mastered through careful trial and error—and said, “We should celebrate. You deserve to have a party. Your _ass_ deserves a party.”

“Indeed, my friends! We should have a great celebration to honor your triumph in this contest.”

“Technically,” Tony put in, “it’s the Hulk whose ass deserves a party, but you’ll have to do, Brucie, since most places in town are so strict on their no shoes, no shirt, no rage monster policies.”

“I’m just glad the poll has closed,” Steve said, sounding more cheerful than he had in weeks. “Now perhaps we can spend less time talking about everyone’s . . . assets.”

“Yeah, like that’s going to happen,” Clint scoffed. “Come on, I vote for Thai. Bruce, you and your ass good with Thai?”

Bruce looked up from the screen and offered Clint a slow smile. “Yeah, sure,” he said, closing the laptop. “Thai sounds good,” because at least Clint wasn’t pouting, or going on about anybody cheating, and Steve was happy for the first time since the stupid contest had started, and Thor was genuinely pleased for him. They all were, he realized, glancing around, and that was . . . kind of amazing. He had come a very, _very_ long way from Brazil.

Clint slung an arm over Bruce’s shoulder, steering him toward the door and going on about how the contest really ought to have been who had the best biceps, and clearly it would come down to him and Thor, who laughed, following behind the two of them. It took Steve only a few moments more, pulling on his jacket and running his hand through his hair because he wasn’t ever going to be comfortable going out if he was less than presentable. And then, for a long moment, it was just Tony left, poking at his phone, and Natasha, who was giving him a long, slow look.

“You rigged the vote,” she said, and it clearly wasn’t a question.

Tony just looked up from his phone and shrugged. “That is a base accusation and I will not stand for it.” 

“Which is not a ‘no,’” she pointed out.

“I can neither confirm nor deny any tampering that may or may not have occurred. I will only point out that Cosmo’s servers are not exactly secure and it’s not outside the realm of possibility that some person or persons might have been able to adjust some numbers, and also that the whole system was entirely too susceptible to robo-voting.” 

Natasha actually smiled faintly at that, just a twist of her lips that spoke more of amusement than a desire for bodily harm. “Not that you would know anything about robo-voting,” she said.

“Not a thing,” Tony said, and now he was grinning.

“Handy that it was Bruce who won, since Clint probably would have pouted if it was anybody else.”

“Bruce deserved a win.”

“Yeah, yeah he did,” she agreed. Turning to the door she glanced back at Tony for a moment. “Coming?”

“Like I’d turn down team-bonding Thai.”


End file.
